Matt Ridley -- The rational optimist ============================================ This is an uplifting and even cheerful book to read. If you are like me and you worry about climate change and the environment, then you may be put off a bit by Ridley's somewhat sweeping aside of concerns about climate and environment that he finds are misguided. But, it's good to see things from the other side. And, Ridley is a extremely witty writer. "The rational optimist" is both enjoyable and well work reading. Rather than try to evaluate Ridley's claims, I'll give some chapter summaries and will let you evaluate and analyse for yourself. - Prologue -- Progress and prosperity come from communication, sharing, collective work, ideas that feed other ideas and thinking, and the benefits of specialization, plus sharing, trading, and selling what you are a specialist in producing. - Chapter 1, A better today -- The past was not better than the present; it was terrible. The future will be better, yet. Today, even the poor are better off than most near everyone of fifty years ago. The things that are important to us are getting cheaper and more available: in particular, food, energy, light, transportation, communications, shelter, and plumbing are available to more of us at lower cost. We live well because we have the work of others available to us; self-sufficiency is the road to poverty. We live well and can do so without slaves, which was *not* possible in ancient times. - Chapter 2, The collective brain -- What makes humans unique and different from other species is that they share, in particular they share knowledge and ideas, goods and services. They communicate ideas and know-how. They trade and barter for goods. They perform tasks and work for each other. Individuals do specialized and different labor and tasks. There is division of labor. And, that encourages individuals to improve the particular tasks that they do. Individuals learn skills and technologies from each other; they innovate; and they pass those innovations along to others. In order to make this sort of progress, a sufficiently large population (with prevalent contacts and communication) is necessary; else the civilization will regress. Self-sufficiency will take you backwards. - Chapter 3, The manufacture of virtue -- The need to negotiate with others, to barter and trade with strangers as well as those we know, and to negotiate with others for our own benefit all teach us to be good people. There is *not* a conflict between Adam Smith's two books [1]: our moral sentiment, which inclines us to need others to be happy on the one hand, and to seek self-interest on the other, are not in conflict. Virtue, cooperation, collaboration, trade, teamwork, and much more are all possible because of the human capacity for empathy and trust. Altruism and cooperation are more natural and innate than their opposites (selfishness and self-seeking in opposition to the efforts of others). The world of human interaction (trade and cooperation) is *not* a zero-sum game; it is one where we both (both sides of many transactions) benefit from trust and cooperation. Acting unfairly in our dealings with others is not, in general, a good strategy for success. The effect is, long term, that the world is becoming more safe and less violent. - Chapter 4, Feeding the nine billion -- Across long-term history, we are feeding more people with less negative impact on the environment. Eating local is not good for us; it is not a good policy in general for all people, though it may be rewarding for some individuals. Improved technology is enabling us to grow and produce more food, and to feed more people with less negative effects on land and air and water etc. - Chapter 5, The triumph of cities -- Population density is needed for innovation and the maintenance of civilization and society. There has been a long-term trend away from more people working on food production (farming) and toward more people working in cities (producing things in addition to food). The ability to trade goods across increasingly longer distances augmented prosperity. Trade across oceans is an extension of this. Free trade between cities and countries produces prosperity and the goods and materials that make our lives better. Ridley warns against bureaucracy, red tape, excessive taxes, restrictions and rules that stifle the formation of businesses and companies and markets and trade. And, free trade causes prosperity. Slums, factories, sweat shops, tenements, etc., according to Ridley are all good: people go there because life is better there than on the farm; people go there hoping for a better life, and eventually find it, for their children and possibly even for themselves. Subsistence farming (farm to fork, eating local) is a poverty trap (except for the already well off); the city offers freedom and opportunity. The city is where the collective brain becomes effective; it's where economic growth is born and happens. And, by the way, living in cities is good for the environment, in part because city dwellers take up less space (have a smaller environmental footprint) than rural dwellers. - Chapter 6, Escaping Malthus's trap -- Most of the world is transitioning from the demographics of high mortality and high fertility to low mortality and low fertility. Those who predict a population explosion and disastrous consequences from it are wrong. Countries lower their birth rates as their populations become healthier, wealthier, better educated, more urbanised, and more emancipated. - Chapter 7, The release of slaves -- Successful capitalism eliminated slavery. Cheap (non-human, non-animal) energy was the enabler. Manufacturers and transportation providers, for example will choose and use non-animal and non-human energy sources when they have the option. Advances in well-being and prosperity were (are) caused by mechanisation, i.e. by the amplification of one person's labour by machinery and fuel. Increased productivity (per person), caused by mechanisation (increased use of machinery and power by workers) enabled workers to produce more, earn more, and become consumers as well as workers. Renewable energy sources cannot replace use of fossil fuels without disastrous consequences for the environment. And, biofuels are the worst of all. Energy efficiency is increasing; we are getting more and more useful work out of each unit of fossil fuel. - Chapter 8, The invention of invention -- Several false predictions: (1) The increase in knowledge and productivity will slow down. (2) The economy and levels of production are headed towards a steady, stable state, diminishing returns, and slower growth (approaching zero). Ridley is trying to explain what drives innovation. And, he is trying to argue that the rate of innovation will not slow down, although where it happens and what field or industry it happens in will shift over time. Science, Ridley claims, is not the driver of innovation; many inventors were not scientists and were not scientifically ignorant. Was capital and investment the driver of innovation? No, says Ridley. Intellectual property protections? No, again, he says. Government. No. Exchange and sharing? Yes, he says. New technologies emerge from the combining of previous technologies. And, our newly enhanced abilities to share information and to work cooperatively will enable us to solve more problems and to solve them more quickly than ever before. Ridley envisions a future which is much more bottom-up. It's a future with much less top-down control, both from governments and within corporations; it's a future in which much more happens through the cooperative efforts of individuals. - Chapter 9, Turning points (pessimism) -- Ridley discounts reasons for feeling pessimistic about the future. His most important arguments in this direction are (1) the future will not be like the past; (2) we will not continue to do things as we've done up until now; and (3) we will be able to solve lots of problems (see previous chapter for more on that). The argument from horse manure: If we kept doing things the way we did in the past, there would be 10 feet of horse manure in every major street of every major city; but, we did not keep doing things the way we did in the past. Ridley believes that this argument can be used as a counter argument to all sorts of pessimistic claims about the future. - Chapter 10, The catallaxy -- The word catallaxy was used and discussed by Ludwig von Mises and Friedrich Hayek. That origin should tell us something about Ridley's leanings. In particular, the ability of markets and economies to thrive in spite of, possibly because of, divergent needs and wants, ideas and values. The only thing that can stop our progress toward greater prosperity is a political system (or perhaps a religious one) that attempts to shut down our attempts to invent and innovate. Ridley's message: arise, collaborate, and innovate. This book contains lots of questionable claims. But it is an inspiring and thought provoking read, all the same. Notes: - [1] Adam Smith: "The wealth of nations" and "Moral sentiments". 04/22/2016 .. vim:ft=rst:fo+=a: